Pinball 2000

Last updated
Pinball 2000
Product type Pinball
Owner Williams Electronic Games
Introduced1999
Website Pinball 2000

Pinball 2000 was the last pinball hardware and software platform developed by major pinball manufacturer Williams, and was used in the machines Revenge from Mars (under the brand name Bally) and Star Wars Episode I (under the brand name Williams) before Williams exited the pinball business on October 25, 1999. It is the successor to the Williams Pinball Controller platform. [1]

Contents

Unlike previous pinball machines, Pinball 2000 machines feature a computer monitor to display animations, scores, and other information. The player perceives this video to be integrated with the playfield, due to a mirrored playfield glass (utilizing an illusion called "Pepper's ghost") that reflects the monitor hung in the head of the machine. [2] This allows the display of virtual game targets in the playfield's upper third that can be "hit" by the machine's physical steel ball. "Impacts" on these targets are detected by physical targets in the middle of the playfield, and by recognizing successful shots up the left and right ramps and orbits/loops. [3]

Revenge from Mars, the first of the two released games, sold a promising 6,878 units. However, Star Wars Episode I suffered from a rushed and top-secret production cycle and sold only about half as many units (3,525), contributing to Williams' decision to close down its historic pinball division.

Development

The Pinball 2000 platform was originally designed to use a backbox video display (replacing the standard dot matrix display) but without the mirroring technique, reminiscent of those seen in Bally's Baby Pac-Man (1982) and Granny and the Gators (1983) or Gottlieb's Caveman (1982) pinball machines. [4] [5]

The first-generation mockup prototype of the Pinball 2000 architecture was called Holopin—it used main designer George Gomez's old Amiga computer to drive the video display, and a No Good Gofers whitewood prototype playfield. The integration of pinball and video was inspired by the Asteroids Deluxe arcade machine, which used a one-way mirror to add a static background graphic to the game's animated vector graphics. [6]

Technical details

A conversion kit for Revenge from Mars was released so it could be converted into a Star Wars Episode I. The kit included a new playfield, ROMs, cabinet decals and a manual plunger.

Games

Released

Planned (unreleased)

References

  1. Staff Writer (1999). "About Pinball 2000". Pinball. Wipavlovpinballlliams Electronic Games. Archived from the original on 29 August 2009.
  2. Rubens, Paul (1 June 2014). "Pinball 2000 – back from the grave?". Pavlov Pinball. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  3. US 6036189,Gomez, George A.; Lawlor, Patrick M.& Uban, Thomas W.,"Game with viewing panel having variable optical characteristics for producing virtual images",published 1999-01-14,issued 2000-03-14
  4. EP 0983779,Popaduik, John A,"Pinball game with crt display",published 1999-08-26,issued 2000-03-08
  5. US 6000697,Popaduik, John A&Skalon, John W,"Display for a pinball game",published 1998-08-19,issued 1999-12-14
  6. Maletic, Greg (8 April 2008). "Special features: Interview with Tom Uban". TILT: The Battle to Save Pinball (DVD). United States: The Future of Pinball LLC. Archived from the original on 2 October 2021.
  7. Staff Writer (1999). "Feedback". Pinball. Williams Electronic Games. Archived from the original on 15 May 2009.
  8. "Pinball 2000 answers details". Hacker News. 2018. The "Pinball 2000 hardware" setup was an ATX motherboard running a MediaGX CPU (x86 clone, it lives on as AMD Geode). It also had a custom PCI card for storage and sound DSP, and a secondary board connected by parallel port for driving lamps and solenoids.
  9. "Pinball 2000 answers details". Hacker News. 2018. We used Allegro as the graphics SDK
  10. "Pinball 2000 answers details". Hacker News. 2018. The name XINA was inspired by XINU, and was an acronym for "XINA Is Not APPLE". APPLE was the previous pinball programming system, no connection to the computer company.
  11. Haase, Enver. "VaaPin - Vaadin interface to Williams/Bally Pinball 2000 machines. Play physical pinball remotely" . Retrieved 13 January 2016.
  12. US 6164644,Cornell, Bradley D; Krutsch, John R& Patla, James A,"Method of modifying electronics contained in a controller box of a pinball machine",published 1999-01-14,issued 2000-12-26
  13. Staff Writer (1999). "Modularity". Pinball. Williams Electronic Games. Archived from the original on 11 January 2005.
  14. Schelberg, Jim (15 September 2001). "Wizard Blocks, A Snapshot in Time". The PinGame Journal. Archived from the original on 5 December 2001.
  15. Staff Writer (2008). "Life After Death III: Warehouse Raid". Pinball News. The third bonus feature is a trip to Gene Cunningham's premises and it begins with a look at Gene's Wizard Blocks and Playboy Pinball 2000 prototypes.
  16. Schelberg, Jim (October 2004). "The WMS Playboy Story". The PinGame Journal. No. 106 via The Pinball 2000 Collectors Pages.
  17. Gomez, George (1999). "The Making of Pinball 2000". Pinball Player. Pinball Owners Association via The Pinball 2000 Collectors Pages.